Is it Time to Knit Yet?

Two for one

We finally got outside today to take some pictures of the Logan River Wrap and my EZ's Percentage Sweater, yay!  I loved knitting both of these, and I love the finished product even more than the process.  Miriam is an uber-talented designer and I love all of her designs, there is never a disappointment when I knit one of her patterns.  What can I say about EZ?  Thankfully she was around to also be super talented and pass on her knowledge for all of us and many more knitters to come.  All I had to do was knit a gauge swatch and follow her directions, and my sweater came out pretty much perfect.  I'm so glad I decided to do a Henley neck, I think it just made the sweater :)  Okay, here's the stats:

• Pattern - Logan River Wrap by Miriam Felton, found in Interweave Knits Winter 2007
• Yarn - Queensland Collection Kathmandu Aran, just over 6 skeins
• Needles - US Size
• Took me - A month and a half
• Comments - Fabulous pattern.  Interesting but easily memorized, and I loved the short rows in the border!

• Pattern - Elizabeth Zimmerman's fair isle yoke sweater - I used directions from The Opinionated Knitter
• Yarn - Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool - about 6 skeins of main color and less than half a skein of each contrasting color
• Needles - US Sizes 5 and 6
• Took me - A month and a half
• Comments - Another fabulous 'pattern'.  I chose to do a Henley neck just as I got to the colorwork, and I did the garter stitch neckline as pictured in the book I used.  Love it!

The Baby did a better job at modeling the wrap, so she gets the main picture on that one.  I wish I had better scenery outside my front door, or in my backyard for that matter, so please ignore any ugliness like the neighbor's truck or fire hydrants, etc ;) Have a great weekend!  I'll just be hanging out and knitting my Sheep 2 Shoe socks, with some spinning mixed in for sure!

Just fiber eye candy today

I'm still not getting comments through my email, so I really apologize for not getting back to you guys!  I have a help ticket going, so I hope it will get resolved soon.  I swear I'm not ignoring you all!!

I managed to go yet another day without taking pictures of the Logan River Wrap and the EPS, so I have to show you something else.  It's been all about the fiber here, hardly any knitting getting done.  I know, sad.  I've been dyeing away and I now have an almost obscene amount of dyed wool hanging around my house in various places.  I'm soaking 1 1/2 pounds of superwash merino right now to be dyed later on today too!  So I'll show you some of what I've done. 

In the spinning department, I did something really silly.  A while ago on a whim, I picked up an ounce of casmere at Three Wishes.  I decided there was no time like the present last night and just went for it.  I did the most horrible job ever!!  Since the fibers are so short, you apparently have to use the long draw method, and while I've done that - it's been a long time.  Eventually I caught on, but it was still not great.  I did two separate bobbins and came up with about 60 yards of a 2-ply yarn.  What am I going to do with that?!  It was fun anyway, but next time (if there is one for cashmere) I'll practice a bit more before diving in.

I also managed to spin up some Ravelry roving that I got from Spunky Eclectic a while ago.  I was going for nice and soft singles, but it didn't quite turn out how I wanted it to, there are spots where I didn't have enough fiber or enough twist.  I'm still happy with it, of course, and now I just need to find something suitable to knit with it.  I also started spinning up some Blue Face Leicester that I dyed.  I'm planning a 3-ply sock yarn and I'm thinking that it will turn out pretty nicely.

Last, I think the Fire on the Mountain yarn is pretty much dry, finally!  I have to put it by the heater and make sure, the house was pretty cold when I checked on it this morning and I'm not sure if it was just cold, or damp.  Hopefully I can split it up and get to knitting!!   Have a great day :)

Socks for The Baby and other stuff

Well first off, I don't know what the problem is but I'm not getting the comments in emails since yesterday, so I'll just answer them here!  My sister says she was just a 'fair-weather' knitter.  I always have to laugh when she says something about me knitting and having patience with it.  She used to knit afghans.  Knitting afghans = TONS of patience, at least for me!   By the way she is one of those that think I'm speaking in a foreign language when it comes to the fiber arts - I do the best I can though to explain what I'm doing for the non-knitters :)

Heather wants to know what pattern I'll use with the new yarn below.  I have no idea yet.  I'll probably just end up doing a pattern from my most used book lately.  I'm thinking maybe another pair of these?  Who knows. And if you've got a suggestion I'll take it :)

Eva says she's coming over to have a fiber playdate and visit The Baby and The Puppy - anytime Eva!!  I have enough fiber to play with, but I'm so boring that I don't know if it would be worth the cost of the ticket ;)

I made socks for The Baby.  She picked out the yarn all by herself so I figured I had to make her some socks.  It is some Koigu in a colorway I really love.  Cute huh?  They were so quick, I think I'll have to make her some more! 

I have lots of other stuff to share with you, but most of it isn't dry.  I will at least get a picture later of the Logan River Wrap when The Boyfriend comes home to help me.  Besides that I'll just be spinning away today - like others I have caught the spinning bug in a major way and it's all I want to do! 

Fire on the Mountain!

It's done!  The Sheep 2 Shoe fiber is finally spun and plied!!  I spent hours on this yesterday, in-between baking bread and dyeing fiber.  I'm surprised that I'm not sore having spun so much.  The idea with the Sheep 2 Shoe kit is that you take the 8 oz. and split it evenly three ways, spin each of those sections onto a bobbin, and then make a three-ply yarn.  The color sections should match up and be like the Blue Moon yarns.  Well I didn't separate them perfectly and so one ply doesn't match up, and I ran out of that one before the other two.  So I have a little bit left on two bobbins and a little bit of fiber left to spin.  I'll spin that and ply again and see what I come up with.  Anyway.  I started this stuff back in January as part of the NaSpiMoMo (Spin More Month for you guys that think I'm speaking a foreign language - you know who you are!).  It took me so long because I got sick and didn't feel like doing any spinning, and then it took me until last week to get the motivation to spin again.  Talk about a project dragging on and on!  So it took me two months to get about 550 yards of 3-ply sock-ish weight yarn, and I am so glad it is finally done.  Now if it would just hurry up and dry so I can get to knitting it!

Catching up

It was a rough night with The Baby, who couldn't stop coughing so I ended up with her on the incredibly uncomfortable fouton, waking up a zillion times to give her a sip of water.  She's still there sleeping now and I'm just trying to be quiet.  I just finished up my Posh Ribbed Socks and I decided to share them today.  The yarn is of course Posh Yarn, this one is Emily, a 4-ply wool/angora/cashmere blend.  Now that they are on my feet, I like them alot.  Very soft and luxurious.  Knitting them?  Not so pleasant.  It felt kind of like cotton and it didn't flow at all, I felt like I was fighting it almost the whole time.  It might have helped to use a larger needle size, I don't know.  I used size 2s.  Anyway.  The pattern was improvised using Cat Bordhi's new sockitecture from the toe-up.  I'm really getting the hang of this method and each time I do it I like it even more.  I may actually convert to being a toe-up sock knitter!    

I managed to get a decent picture of The Baby's Swing Coat even though she was still not feeling good that day.  I really like how it turned out.  It seems a little on the short side on the main body, but I was ready to be done knitting it so it has to be good enough.  I didn't finish the collar and I kind of like it that way.  I did do an i-cord border along the rest of the edges, excluding the sleeves.  I made the size 6 sweater, so hopefully she'll be able to wear it for a while!  Oh yeah, the yarn is Mission Falls Cotton.

Now that this stuff is done, I was surprised to find out that I only have two Works in Progress now!  That is unusual for me.  I'm making a cute pair of socks for The Baby, and the other is my saddle shoulder sweater that needs sleeves.  Today will be spent dyeing up another pound of fiber, I'm trying to do one per day to use up all of my mixed up dyes before they go bad.  And I'll be spinning as much as I can since I'm getting really close to having all of my Sheep2Shoe fiber on bobbins - I'm ready to get it plied up and have it done!  More bread is in the works too, along with some chicken soup.  Yum.  See you on Monday!

Playing Domestic Engineer

Yesterday was a busy day in the kitchen.  Early on I decided to make some bread, and even though I left it in the oven a touch too long it was still very good.  You can't really go wrong with warm bread and butter though, now can you?!  I love the smell of bread baking - as Rachel Ray would say, Yummo! 

I also needed to use up some dates and raisins, and I found this recipe for Sugarless Bars.  They are so good!  They ended up more like cake and they taste very nice.  I was quite impressed, and it is a super easy recipe too.  That recipe will definitely go in my recipe binder.   

No one got left out here yesterday, not even The Puppy.  She got her own special batch of chicken flavored doggie treats.  I didn't taste them but I assume she liked them as she's been sniffing around for more ever since I gave her one. 

I managed to cook up some fiber too.  Only a fiber enthusiast would think that dyed fiber looks good enough to eat I guess ;)  Not bad for a day's work, at least for me anyway.

I've finally finished what could possibly be the fugliest socks ever knitted.  It's okay.  I know.  They are Fugly.  The Boyfriend says they aren't that bad, but yes, yes they are.  The colors looked fine to me in the ball, but man once I started knitting this yarn I couldn't believe it.  The yarn is Steinbach Woole Aktiv Effekt, and while I hate the colors I really like how the yarn feels.  It is nice and soft and it really was a pleasure to knitwith,  except for the occasional splitting.  I'm sure glad they are done though, and now I can move on with my life!  (And knit something pretty instead!)

That's all I've got - have a great weekend!  Hopefully I'll get some pictures taken of the cool FOs so I can show them off for you :)

Hemlock Ring Blanket

Well the Hemlock Ring Blanket is done!  This is the best picture I could get - it blends in too well with my carpet color so I didn't do a shot with it all spread out on the floor.  Anyway, the blanket.  I love it!  I wasn't paying attention and I knit a few more rounds than Jared did, like 10 more really really long rounds.  It ended up being a nice size, big enough to cover my bottom half and then some.  I think I ended up with 500 + stitches toward the end of it, I don't remember exactly, but I do know I had 134 border points to pin out when it was all done.  I didn't do a fantastic job with the blocking, but I think it turned out pretty well.  I used Cascade EcoWool as well, and I still have a nice amount of my second hank left.  All in all it was enjoyable to knit, a nice pattern that wasn't too difficult at all, and with a satisfying result.  It's already been doing a great job of keeping my legs warm while sitting in my cold house :)

As always, thanks for looking and have a great day! 

My newest scarf

Last night I finished up my Multidirectional Scarf.  I like it!  It was a fun and easy pattern and I like the effect that it had with this yarn.  The whole thing only took me a few hours of knitting that I happily did while watching one of my new favorite shows - Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations.  He makes me want to travel everywhere and even eat a lot of the crazy stuff that he tries - I'll pass on the male animal parts though, if you know what I mean.  I also blocked my Hemlock Ring Blanket yesterday and it is done, all done.  But I'm going to make you wait for that one :) 

In other stuff, I'm planning on a spinning frenzy since The Baby is a little under the weather and will mostly be resting on the couch today.  I want to finish up the last third of my Sheep2Shoe kit so I can finally get it plied before February is over.  It should have been done last month, but I got sick and life got in the way giving me not much time for spinning.  Anyway.

As always thanks for looking, and have a great day :)

Plugging Away

I've been busy again all weekend.  Knitting and trying to organize and clean up my house has kept me occupied, even though I don't seem to be getting very far with all of it.  I have some finished stuff that still needs photos or actual finishing like blocking and sewing on of buttons.  When I actually do get all of it done it will be a Finished Object Festival over here for about a week!

I finished reading A Thousand Splendid Suns - it was amazing.  It is so hard to read about how hard life can be for people, especially when their lives are torn apart by war.  Yes the book is fiction, but it is definitely a glimpse into what can be reality for many many real people.  It wasn't all gloom and doom though, there is a touching story of love and finding friendship where one wouldn't expect, and hope as well.  I know I don't put things as they are stirring around in my head, so I'll just end my review there and tell you to read it!  The next book I started this morning is this one.  I'm not obsessed with war, I swear - these books have all been sitting around for well over 6 months (at least) and I'm just going through the pile getting them read. 

I started a new project needing something quick and easy to knit.  It is the Multidirectional Scarf and I'm using some Berroco Jasper.  The yarn isn't terribly variegated so the effect isn't as cool as it could possibly be, but I'm enjoying it anyway.  The biggest variation I'm getting is those lighter stripes going through the reds and browns.  I'm halfway done as I only got two skeins of this yarn, so it should probably be done today or tomorrow.  I'm also working away on my Saddle Shoulder Sweater with about 11 inches done on the body.  Being all stockinette, it is good reading knitting and so it also should get lots of progress this week.  Also on the knitting front, I finished up the Hemlock Ring Blanket on Saturday night, yay!  I don't have enough pins to block it though, so I'm waiting on that. 

I am feeling better, a lot more so than last week and thank you for the kind comments.  We tried to have a good time, Friday afternoon/evening was spent building a mini sledding hill for The Baby and it turned out pretty good!  She had a blast on it too.  Every time I go into the kitchen I have these pretty flowers that finally opened up to brighten my mood too, so that helps.  I'm looking forward to SnB this week, and I get to go spend the night at my sister's house this weekend so they can go have a nice anniversary present and I'll be surrounded by small children - it should be fun!! 

Hemlock in progress

It's been a bad week here so I haven't felt like blogging much.  I haven't even taken any pictures of finished objects because I haven't felt like doing anything.  I did start up again on my Hemlock Ring Blanket after getting another needle.  I'm getting close to the edging according to the chart, but I've still got a long way to go.  Each row is now taking me about 15 minutes so I have at least a few good hours of knitting before this thing is done.  It's looking good though.  I guess I'll also leave you with a sneak peek of the Logan River Wrap blocking.